February Challenge: THE SCARLET PACT (Board Game/TTRPG Highlights)

This month's theme was called, "THE SCARLET PACT," which highlighted games in my collection that have red/pink components, or showcase different emotions, like passion or love to even anger or vengeance! 😈

Here are the ones I like to highlight:

- Kreel Manor: The Dungeon Crawl Card Game

- DOOM PILGRIM Pocket

- Yazeba's Bed & Breakfast

- Crypts of Obscurum

1. Kreel Manor: The Dungeon Crawl Card Game


If you are already familiar with Tristan Hall's world of Kilforth and Veilwraith: A Veil Odyssey Game, well this game takes you back just before the end of the world. There is a "tear in the Veil" between the two worlds releasing deadly monsters into Kilforth. The source leads them to this dark and evil citadel, Kreel Manor. If you are already familiar with the mechanics of Veilwraith, then you will have no problem learning how to play Kreel Manor. 

You pick your hero and you have 3 different abilities (Fight, Influence, and Sneak) that you can use to slay Foes, Threats, Plots, Obstacles or Locations. The abilities shift into different "slots" (1, 2, 3) above your board as you use them. The tricky thing with this game is timing of when to "power up" your abilities when you have multiple Threats in play (cards that are faced up) or (if you can) attack a Threat in the shadow area (cards that are faced down). When a threat is in the shadow area, it's not active yet. But, you do have a choice if you want to spend your sneak action to reveal the threat. When you have defeated the foes, locations and all 5 plots, then you win that part of the campaign and can upgrade your skills.

The cool thing about this is the LOREEEEE. As you know, I am obsessed with Tristan Hall's worldbuilding within his games and the Book of Fables (a gamebook) adds so much to the adventure. Certain cards will show when to pull out the Book of Fables and you will be given the next steps of the adventure... maybe you opened a barrel full of loot you can equip to your hero, or you discovered more about this history of Kreel Manor. The adventure is amazing! It's also highly replayable, you have so many cards to go through (that can also be a downside lol, setup definitely took some time for me since there are A LOT). And you can even play it as just a single adventure, not a campaign.

Check out my post on Instagram to learn more.

2. Doom Pilgrim Pocket 


I'm sure it's obvious by now that I LOVE the dark fantasy vibes, and this pocket narrative-adventure is exactly that. It's not just dark and gloomy, it's BRUTAL too. There are a total of 90 cards and your goal is to simply survive and go through the entire deck of cards. You might think that's a lot, and yes. You are absolutely right but, don't worry there are ways you can adjust the difficulty.

Normal - 45 Cards

Hard - 60 Cards

VERY Hard - 90 Cards

The unique thing about this game is that you LITERALLY start with nothing. No starter weapons, no gold, no allies, nothing. The cards you choose will tell you exactly what happens. You might be entering a town of lepers and they infect you... Maybe you decided to explore an icy tundra and you get lost and get tired after traveling for so long... Or, you come across a witch and you have a chance to steal her potions! 

Check out my post on Instagram here.

3. Yazeba's Bed & Breakfast


This is a cozy slice-of-life tabletop rpg game where players are experiencing what it's like to stay at this quirky bed and breakfast. If you'd like to read a little snippet of one of my adventures, check out my post here. 

If there's one thing that I LOVE about this system, is that it strictly focuses on storytelling. There are no complicated mechanics to follow, it's simply roleplaying your character or a premade one! The adventures in this book are fun too. After you finish one, you get to review and add to your character's journey. Maybe they unlocked a certain skill, or maybe they can add a little trinket to their bookshelf. 

There is so much packed into this book!!! 

Check out my reel to see some of the amazing art. 

4. Crypts of Obscurum


This has quickly become a favorite of mine this month. It is such a fun dungeon-crawler gamebook. The rules are very simple and easy to follow and understand. You just need some dice and a deck of cards, where that deck will represent the dungeon layout. Then, depending on the face of the card, flip to the page that matches the card and you can read the encounter.

Check out a video I made on the Character Creation and a Playthrough!

Goals for Next Month:

My next theme for for the upcoming month are Small-Box-Fun games!!! So, they would be games that come in small travel-size boxes that you can take with you on vacations or play at a cafe. I feel like small games that are easy to play, and yet still have a lot of punch, are essential to anyone's collection. 

You ever have those days where you do want to play a board game, but you dread set up? I definitely feel that from time to time, so I'll show you small games that are easy to just whip out and play!

Another goal is to develop another game... yes, you read that right! An idea popped up after a work meeting, and I thought to myself... what if you were hired by a company to explore a dungeon? SO, I thought of a potential name, "Dungeoneer for Hire!" I was thinking of 3 different employers that have have OKRs they'd like to meet. Maybe one employer has a goal to be the best for slaying the most monsters, and they meet that goal by hiring dungeoneers that slay at least 75% of the monsters in the dungeon... but wait, they have to watch out for their competitors as well!

I DON'T KNOW. I am obviously still thinking through this. This will be a solo-only dungeon crawler ttrpg, but we shall see! I'm just letting the ideas flow through!

And finally, another goal is to post an actual LIVE-PLAYTHROUGH of myself playing my CAIRN Campaign, A Vinekin's Revenge. I am so excited (and a bit nervous), to show you how my brain works with solo play. 

Thank you my friends for all the support!!! 

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